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Batman Returns (US - DVD R1)

Dustin McNeill looks over the special edition of Burtons second Bat flick...

If you've ever owned the original release of Batman Returns on DVD, it most likely left you longing for a special edition somewhere down the road. Don't get me wrong, the production notes included on the disc were absolutely riveting and I mourn their absence here like I mourn the loss of the pan and scan transfer, but somehow I'll have to find a way to sleep at night without both. Aside from never understanding the title, Batman Returns is my all time favourite bat flick, so I apologize in advance for the overly-positive review of the overly-dark Batman movie.

It's time again for my box set plug. Unless you're one of those who would sooner put nipples on the bat suits than buy one of Schumachers films, you can purchase this as part of the Batman Motion Picture Anthology box set. While it was considerably cheaper to buy them as a whole when they came out, this apparently is no longer the case. But seriously, these special editions don't boast pretty package artwork and do you really want those ugly spines staring you in the face from your shelf? Of course not, you want that big attractive box set spine with the bat logo looking back at you.

Feature In this sequel, Batman has a trio of characters to rid the streets of Gotham City of. The first is Max Shreck, an incredibly corrupt businessman at the head of Shreck Industries polluting Gotham with waste chemicals. The second is his secretary, Selena Kyle, whom Shreck murdered. Supernatural forces bring Selena back to life in the form of a Catwoman and this kitty's hungry for revenge. Last is the Penguin, a deformed individual who's risen to mayoral candidate thanks to the empathetic hearts of Gotham and backing of Shreck. Deep down, he wants revenge of the people on Gotham for having everything he never had living in the sewers, namely a childhood.

I heavily resent the negative response this film has been given by the public. I suppose they prefer their super hero films dumb and loud? I admire Burton for giving us such an intelligent Batman film with several layers of story to it. Maybe it's the maniacally sinister plan to turn Batman into what he hates most—a criminal—that really entices me. They don't want to kill Batman; they want to positively destroy him.

Somewhere on one of the documentaries on the Batman Forever special edition, someone says that "Batman is all about duality" and they're absolutely right. Look closer at these villains and that's exactly what you'll see, fragmented pieces of Batman. Oswald Cobblepot (Penguin) is the part of Bruce that lost his parents at a very young age and has never recovered from it. Max Shreck is a warped vision of businessman Bruce Wayne only without any morals. Catwoman is the part of Bruce that hides behind a mask only confused as to which side of the law she belongs on. I greatly enjoyed Burton teasing the audience with the question of Catwoman’s motives. Catwoman aside, these aren't plot points taken from the comic book, these were made for the movie and I commend the filmmakers on them.

I was astonished at just how much Danny Elfman improved upon his previous Batman score with Batman Returns. Every character has their own motif and they're all woven together masterfully as the film progresses. This is the story with almost every other aspect of production, bigger and better, especially set design. With the clever use of miniatures and mattes, Batman Returns is a visually epic film to look at. Almost everything in the movie is huge with massive sets including a huge Shreck department store building, sewer lair, the Bat Cave, Wayne Manor, and the streets of Gotham. If nothing else, the movie is fun to look at.

The only part of Batman Returns that really left me scratching my head was the ending. Penguins with rocket launchers on their backs? Batman just happens to have a single button remote control to jam the signal? I can only suspend disbelief so much for these films. I bought the cats licking Selena Kyle back to life. I also bought the yellow ducky-mobile that Penguin drives around in. I even kept myself from questioning what the heck the Bat-boat was doing in the sewers, but an army of penguins? It's a stretch, and luckily the film doesn't harp on it for too long.

Getting back to positives, once again, casting is dead on. It may seem like I'm copying the format of my Batman review here, but both films earn similar praises that, I can assure you, won't be given to the next two Bat films. The three baddies of Batman Returns are all thoroughly enjoyable thanks to stellar performances. I expected nothing less than greatness from Danny DeVito and Christopher Walken, but who knew Michelle Pfeiffer could play crazy so well? Despite minimal screen-time, Michael Keaton again defies logic and plays a great Batman/Bruce Wayne. Michael Gough and Pat Hingle wonderfully reprise their roles as Alfred Pennyworth and Commissioner Gordon.

In the end, I enjoyed Batman Returns considerably more than I did Batman. Maybe it's because we didn't have to be introduced to the world of Batman again, that the movie jumps right into the action. Maybe it's because Burton serves up a more complex story this time. Either way, this is great stuff as far as summer blockbusters go. Come to think of it, rather odd to have a summer blockbuster set during Christmas, right?

Video Warner Brothers gives us Batman Returns in it's original aspect ratio of 1:85;1 anamorphic widescreen. When this title was announced, I sold back my original 1997 release, so I've nothing to compare it to, but on its own, Batman Returns looks very good. For a film that at times feels noir, it's all going to be about black levels, and thankfully this transfers black levels are near perfect. From the Penguin’s sewer lair to the Bat Cave, the movie looks fantastic.

Audio Batman Returns is outfitted with Dolby Digital 5.1 track along with a DTS 5.1 track. As was the case last go-around in 5.1, the star of the soundtrack is without question Elfman’s score. When things get loud, the track sounds good and no matter what the volume is, dialogue is always easy to distinguish from the score/effects. I've heard better tracks, but I've also heard worse.

Extras I failed to mention in my review of Batman how nice it was for Tim Burton, Jack Nicholson, Danny Elfman and the rest of the lot to return for new retrospective interviews. The same goes for Danny DeVito and Michelle Pfeiffer in this picture. I wouldn't have been surprised if any of them would've wanted to forget their involvement and focus on a more serious career—but everyone here is a fantastic sport, and I was surprised at just how invested these performers were in their roles. Michael Keaton, however, chose not to participate in any of these special editions and is represented in archive footage only. I guess at the time these features were produced he was busy preparing for his acclaimed role in Herbie: Fully Loaded? Keaton has never been much for celebrity and his absence here is very unfortunate.

On disc one we have the original theatrical trailer and a director commentary by Tim Burton. Burton re-hashes much of what you'll hear in the documentaries on disc two, so this commentary can be skipped without missing too much. What you won't hear on disc two is Burton discuss more in depth public expectation for the film and more of his reasoning behind creative choices concerning characters, designs, and story. Don't take my less than stellar opinion of Burton’s commentary as a stab at the director however, as his involvement in these special editions makes them worth owning.

Disc two first offers up 'The Bat, the Cat, and the Penguin', a promotional featurette from 1992 hosted by Robert Urich of Love Boat fame. I recall my father taping this for me when it originally aired because I had baseball practice that particular night. Seeing it now, I realize how badly this featurette stinks of promotion. It's really nothing more than a twenty-two minute commercial with talking heads. Worth watching only for the nostalgia, if you want a real behind the scenes feature, seek it elsewhere on the disc.

Next up is the fourth instalment of 'Shadows of the Bat: The Cinematic Saga of the Dark Knight' entitled 'Dark Side of the Knight'. The first three parts can be found on the Batman special edition. Clocking in at a noticeably shorter than last go-around thirty minutes, the featurette really covers a lot of ground for its duration. The most fascinating bits are the parts on pre-production with sketches, stories, and home video footage. A very entertaining feature.

The meat of disc two is the 'Beyond Batman' section which is a collection of six short documentaries on specific aspects of production. A wonderfully convenient feature is the 'Play All' option which links them together for a running time of just over an hour. They cover music, costumes, production design, and much more. These are definitely not items to miss on disc two. I don't know whose idea it was, but it seems like every moment of production was videotaped for historical purposes, and their inclusion on the disc makes for a most insightful look back at what went on. My favourite part of 'Beyond Batman' is 'Assembling the Arctic Army' which features footage and interviews with Stan Winston on creating the animatronic penguins. I didn't even realize they were animatronic, which speaks highly of Winston’s team.

A third feature standard to all Batman special editions is a heroes and villains gallery. You may wonder what more could be said about the Batman and Alfred that wasn't said in the previous heroes entry, but that's the fun part. These aren't all-encompassing biographies of the characters, but rather cover what the characters are going through in the film in mention. The villains gallery is worth seeing because of the insight on how screenwriter Daniel Waters reinvented both Catwoman and the Penguin from their comic book counterparts. Combined, these two features run a total of eighteen minutes.

Lastly we have a music video by Siouxsie and the Banshees. I usually detest music videos that mix trippy footage of the band with clips from a film as a cross-promotion, but it actually turns out well here. The song features the Catwoman motif from Elfmans score and the footage cleverly recreates the cinematography/lighting schemes of the film. To say the least, it's light-years better than anything Prince did for the previous film.

Overall I greatly enjoyed Batman Returns and likewise enjoyed this special edition DVD. The running time of supplemental features may be considerably shorter than it's predecessor's special edition, but this release leaves nothing to be desired. From technical aspects to supplements, I would whole-heartedly recommend this DVD to anyone.

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SnakePETER wrote: 'begins' tried a bit too hard to be completely realistic, and believeable... and sorry, but I can't remember at what point in time it was when 'detective comics' became 'batman: the true story'.I always thought this film was a movie designed to be fun rather than a solid drama. I thought that this film was meant to be a mix of the original dark stories with a hint of the 60s tv series... Unless of course I am mis-reading your post SnakePETER

'begins' tried a bit too hard to be completely realistic, and believeable... and sorry, but I can't remember at what point in time it was when 'detective comics' became 'batman: the true story'.

i agree with the statement made about 'forever' being the worst one ever... 'batman & robin' didn't sicken me as much as 'forever' did.... I don't know why, but maybe it had something to do with uma thurman in spandex... or most likely the fact that 'forever' already prepared me for the worst.... but in any way, i'd like to forget that either of them ever existed.

And also, there is one thing that has always bothered me about Returns; and that's Gotham City itself. The city doesn't really seem anything like in the first movie, with broad open streets replaced with narrow alleys, and also the almost complete lack of automobiles makes the Gotham City of Returns seem like a bunch of skyc**pers placed too close to each other.

Nah, Dustin, that wasn't an angry post. Had it been all in caps, then I woulda thought it woulda been an angry post.

"But seriously, these special editions don't boast pretty package artwork and do you really want those ugly spines staring you in the face from your shelf? Of course not, you want that big attractive box set spine with the bat logo looking back at you."

Couldn't agree more with you, Dustin, the R2 artworks with the stand alone logos were the coolest things I'd ever seen.

I never really cared for Batman Returns, and it shunted Batman to the sidelines to make room for The Penguin and Catwoman (Michelle Pfieffer did an awesome job) -- heck, all the pre-Begins Batman films shunted the Batman character to make room for the outlandish villains. But the movie is just overtly strange at times and really stretches credulity (c'mon, penguins with rocket launchers and The Penguin riding a tiny rubber ducky mobile just brings you out of the film). But Burton did have a unique visual design that's gorgeous to look at and I liked other aspects of the film, but I prefer Batman Begins and Burton's Batman. (It sounds sacreligious to say that, but that's the way I feel.)

On the other hand, I thought Batman Forever was the worst pre-Begins Batman film. They never should've casted Jim Carrey and Tommy Lee Jones as The Riddler and Two-Face in the first place... that's all I'm going to say. At least Batman & Robin had some camp value that made it halfway watchable.

DVD Active doesn't get press copies of every new DVD and on top of that, if we did, we wouldn't have the time to review them all. Sure, there are some websites that review every new DVD but if you look at them, they're nowhere near the quality of the reviews on this site. It's about quality here, not quanity.

I can't speak for the other reviewers but it takes me about three sittings and several hours to dish out a formatted review with screen captures... it takes a good bit of time.

Looking at this current weeks DVD releases, I see High School Musical, Cheaper by the Dozen 2, Hollow Man 2, some SNL discs, and a few special edition DVDS like Boondock Saints, Patton, and the Dirty Dozen. Those last three are great and hopefully someone here will get to them... but I would MUCH rather go back and review the Batman flicks that touch most of what else comes out each week. Get my drift?

I recall that this was almost rated are and that my dad and brother almost didn't take 7-year-old me to go see this with them. I managed to collect 3 of the 4 McDonald's Happy Meal toys, but then they were ripped from restaurants because some parents group tried to sue them for marketing toys associated with a dark, violent, and disturbing movie to kids. This group and these toys are the reason that McD's doesn't promote PG-13 films anymore through Happy Meals, resulting in the sc**pping of toys for Pirates back in 2003. This same group attempted to go after Burger King with the Revenge of the Sith toys last year, but didn't get their way, luckily. How can you deprive kids of Star Wars??

Anyway, I really did not enjoy this Bat-film when I first saw it. In fact, this was the only one my parents did not buy for me. I later ended up buying it on VHS in 2000, just months before we switched to DVD. After seeing it again on DVD when I got the first box set for Christmas, I enjoyed it so much more and loved how multi-dimensional each character was. Keaton and Pfeiffer's scenes are the best.

Greatest memory of this film: When I convinced my dad and 11-year-old brother to take me to this, I will never forget the scene in which the Penguin bites off the guy's nose. A boy younger than me, maybe 4 or 5, screamed, jumped up from his seat a few rows in front of me, bolted across his row of people, and sprinted up the aisle to the exit bellowing I DON'T WANNA BE HERE and then started to cry as he got to the door and pushed it open to leave. The parents followed soon after, more embarrassed than concerned for their son.

And seriously, Dustin, who will miss pan and scan? That's not even funny to joke about...Great reviews on both films so far, by the way. But as someone asked on the other one, why the delay for these reviews?

it always upset me that this film never received nowhere near as much respect as it truly deserves (ugh, and to think of the c**p that followed) ... then to make matters worse, you have people like that assclown editor from batman-on-film.com who trashes "returns" in every other sentence, rather than actually reporting on anything new, or constructive......

argh I hate hearing people associate 'begins' with these films.... hell, I even hate when the 'schumacher' films are associated with 'burton's'... i've been a diehard batfan my whole life since as far back as I can remember, and personally even though 'begins' was a good film it totally sucked the life, or shall I say romance out of the character.

you cant ban me motherf**ks! LOL I'm back to mess with all you fagets at dvdactive! Come on without me it just isnt any fun! I have more than one e-mail address. I used my g-friends on this one so dont go seding her wierd e-mails! so ill be around f**king with you homos! rock on! p.s. Gay powers bring it on hommie! lol

This one has always had a special place in my viewing rotation. The story I really didn't care for. Penquin and Catwoman were far more interesting than our hero in this one. But, the look of this film is, to me, spot on for a Bat film.

I thought the only film to fittingly pair villains was Returns. The Catwoman and Penguin weren't just freaks who wanted it out for Batman, they had backstories and layers to them.

Returns set a standard of pairing up of villains which isn't neccesary to tell a good Batman story. I would've liked to have seen Riddler, Two-Face, Mr. Freeze, Poison Ivy, and most of all - Bane - in their own seperate stories. If the writers can manage to intertwine them, great... but they deserve better stories than these.

Dustin wrote: Most thought it was going to be a kiddie movie, I suppose. Which, being Batman of course, was the way it was marketed. It's very dark and downright nasty in parts, and more than any other Batman movie is not really suitable for the kids, so it's no wonder the particular target audience of kids and families didn't like it all that much. I liked it for the most part myself, but you have to admit it's a mean spirited movie. My biggest problem with this one, Forever, and Batman & Robin is that the teaming up of the villians seems overly forced and awkward, which is something they definitely got right with Begins.

Dustin wrote: Steven, I'm working on Forever and Batman & Robin as I type this... should be up within a week. As for Begins... another reviewer has claimed it but it won't be up anytime soon...

And Trap Door, no deleted scenes here. I was unaware that they existed for this film? I could be wrong but wasn't there a scene where the police commissioner and mayer asking each other if Batman would forgive them?

This is my third favorite batman movie; the first being Batman Forever ( Yeah, I know, I`m the only one who feels this way, but I just loved that film, even though I can see why many people dislike it), next would be Begins, than Return, then Batman, and I don`t even compare B&R to these. It was utter tripe! If Phantasm counts, it`s definately my #1 favorite.

Gabe I agree with you about Mask of The Phantasm, it is a wonderful movie. As much as I enjoyed the other Batman movies, even the Schumachers (eventually) I have a soft spot for Mask. As for our small minded "friend", Active will be a better place without him and his vomit inducing vitriol. Prompting constructive debate is one thing, but out and out insulting someone is a different matter entirely. Keep up the good work guys!

Yeah, but usually when I get s**t from readers it's thought out and despite possible anger behind it, it can promt discussion. This guy's the first in a while to just let loose like a sleepy 7 year old.

We seem to attract more educationally sub-normal readers since we switched from Answers to Active... I mean seriously, what is missing in certain people's lives that prompts them to insult a bunch of strangers on the Interweb? I'm sure he was having a great time pounding away on his tiny little phallus while formulating his next post, but I just found the whole thing very boring.